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IhaveamotherafatherIhavealakebymyhomewithadogItaketothatlake Ihaveasistera brother and a bird that visits me each morning as we go to my lake at daybreak

The lake is a pool in my heart my heart an island in that lake I visit my heart in water I swim its beating waters You can evaporate my water but can’t extinguish my heart You might clench what is beating but you can’t grasp my springs.

Time pieces

Things seen and overheard: 1992:

At a sporting event somewhere in the D.C. metropolitan area:

“If a jury acquitted a cop of beating one of us there wouldn’t be any riot.” 1993:

A thirteen-year-old kid at a religious youth event in Montgomery County, Maryland:

“They all have names like Shaniqua and Towanda. Darnell, Sharell, and Mwaka. Names that aren’t even real.”

1995:

In a house in Richmond on a youth getaway weekend:

“Oh yeah. She’s got a jigaboo boyfriend. Nappy hair and bubble lips.”

2005:A few days after Katrina, at a Labor Day Weekend picnic in a backyard of suburban Hartford:

“Did you see those jigaboos looting their own grocery stores?” 2015:

And these remarks taken from the comments section of a YouTube video found at random:

Featured Author

In the current issue

Born premature, with a hole in the heart, on 15 October 1954, to Polish-German, delicatessen-running parents in Melbourne, Australia, Peter Bakowski fell in love with the map of the world and reading at an early age. Peter and his wife, Helen, a clothes-maker, travel to Europe annually, particularly Paris and most recently Berlin. 2019 represents

WHALE BONE LAMP Annabelle Obscura wears a widow’s bun Knotted ‘round a hook of whale bone That her young Captain had Carved with the marks of saints In a peculiar kind of Braille That felt like the lost promises Of a forgotten summer land Her fingers leave red marks Like the phases of the moon

IN THE GARDEN Searching for a herb named solace; they say it grows in hard ground; I am sure it used to grow here, somewhere. It goes with nearly everything. Perhaps it is nowhere to be found. Better than heart’s ease, growing among honesty and patience. THE HUNGOVER FOREST (In memory of naturalist Gerald Durrell,

The Blue Nib is a print and digital platform that publishes and promotes the work of established and emerging poets and writers. Main outputs are the quarterly Blue Nib Magazine which is sold through subscription and is available as a print magazine or digitally on the website and via download. The magazine features the work of both emerging and established poets and writers.Find out more